


Veni Vidi Vici

by gunsforeyes



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:21:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27517549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gunsforeyes/pseuds/gunsforeyes
Summary: Quick character study, backstory, and musings on what it means to be Jonah Magnus/Elias Bouchard. I just love this grinning little freak. Rating for general Elias-related themes.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2





	Veni Vidi Vici

He’d felt it long before he’d ever met Robert Smirke, before he had a title, a categorization for it, before he’d learned that fear and power could be intertwined. He’d felt it as a child, as Jonah Magnus, only child of Bartholomew and Constance Magnus. 

One of the greatest indignities of childhood, he’d always thought, was the compulsion it instilled in the surrounding adults to _watch._ ‘Could you watch Jonah?’ his mother had asked the nurse, the nurse had asked the governess, the governess had asked the gardener. Watch Jonah. Keep an eye on him. Make sure he doesn’t misbehave, make sure he doesn’t get hurt, make sure he does as he is told. _Watch_ him. Ensure that he has no privacy, that he has no room to think, to relax, to grow. Smother him. Censure him. Judge him. Control him. 

The feel of eyes upon him made his skin crawl. Made him itch, made him burn, ignited a helpless rage inside his small body. No one else seemed to mind it. Other children seemed to actually delight in it, seeking it out, begging for attention. Jumping up and down with excitement at the thought that their parents, friends, even strangers were watching them perform whatever inane activity they seemed to think they excelled in. It was unbearable. It was pathetic. Did they not understand what it meant? Did they not feel that discomfort in their very bones? Was it, perhaps, that all others except himself were so simplistic they did not understand what it meant to be _watched?_

It wasn’t that he’d felt the draw towards loneliness, not in the way that Peter had. It was merely that the only way to ensure that he wasn’t watched was to be alone. To set himself apart. And then he’d discovered that he didn’t really mind it.

It was too late to stop his parents, his caretakers from knowing who he was. They knew his temperament, they knew his childhood thoughts, they knew his hobbies and his activities and his proficiencies at his studies. But it was not too late to change their roles. It was not too late to hide and listen and watch, to pay attention to quiet gossip and doors left cracked. He learned that he could feed them what information he pleased, whether it was true or not, and he could collect the truth of others on his own. 

At first, it had simply been for survival, for comfort. Even if he did nothing about it, it was satisfying to know everything that went on. There was a safety in it, that no one and nothing could surprise him or catch him off guard, that no one could pry deeper than he allowed. Adults often told children things thoughtlessly, assuming they wouldn’t understand or wouldn’t remember or wouldn’t care. Jonah understood, remembered, and cared deeply. 

But as he grew, he realized there was more power to knowledge than he’d thought. A word here and there, casual and innocent, and he could change the shape of his small world. People would see what they wanted to see, and Jonah made sure they saw him as harmless and helpful. And, if needed, he could gently remind them what he knew. Or not-so-gently. 

He knew that things were not always what they appeared. He knew that there was far more beneath the surface, of people, of the world, than most assumed. Most people were happy to live in ignorance. But ignorance was not bliss to Jonah. It was terror, it was helplessness, it was vulnerability. And it was not gullibility that led him to his studies of the occult and esoteric. 

Still, he had not planned to act upon what Smirke had told them. He did not consider himself to be rash and careless, and to be so in this circumstance would mean certain death, or worse. He wanted to think more on it, to collect more information, to consider all aspects of this revelation and what it might mean for him. But his fellows were less careful. 

Everything in this world is done out of fear. Friendships, marriages are made out of the fear of being alone. Children are born out of the fear of a bloodline ended, of an old age spent uncared for. Good deeds are done out of the fear of being judged, whether by one’s peers or by a god after death. And Jonah began to formulate his plan out of fear. 

He would not be a victim, and more importantly, he would not let his fear be seen. He would not let it be consumed, save by the one to whom he offered it up in exchange for its power. 

But the Eye is largely passive, at least to an outside observer. It watches, it feeds, it is a voyeur of pain, but it is not direct and violent like some others, like the Desolation, or the Slaughter. And neither was Jonah, at least not at the start. He waited and watched, and he did what he could to prevent the rituals from coming to pass, but still he was afraid. Still it did not seem like enough, and he was still only one man, and there were so many who sought to bring their patrons into the world. 

It seems callous, the course of action he finally set his mind to. It seems cruel and monstrous. But fear will always bring out the darkest in humanity. Bloody wars have been waged out of fear. Genocides, torture, oppression, even mundane cruelties are done out of fear, every day. When one is faced with the destruction of one’s world, of one’s eternal agony, of that most final and unacceptable of terrors - death itself - it seems almost natural that one would commit atrocities to prevent it. 

The knowledge that Jonah Magnus had, that Robert Smirke had, that Maxwell Rayner and Peter Lukas and so many others had, was more than a mortal mind could bear whilst keeping its humanity. And so humanity was discarded. It had to be. There was too much at stake. 

Jonah knew it was him, or them. And once he gained the ability to See as he did, to hear and to Know all that he turned his mind to, his decision was easy. 

Humans are only able to love because of ignorance, because of deception. They put their best faces forward, hide their darkness, revealing only a glimpse of it at a time, showing only those parts of themselves they think will be most acceptable. And they see in others what they want to see. Two people can grow old together happily without ever truly knowing the other. And that is the only reason they are happy. 

He had taken a few lovers in his youth, but it rankled, that they thought such interactions meant more than what they were. They thought his movements meant tenderness, that his exhalations meant love, that what he asked for and demanded and gave allowed them some insight into his being. And as he grew older, grew more powerful, the less desire he was able to muster for another’s presence. 

When Jonah Saw, he gave up that luxury, and to him it seemed a fair trade. What pure love can there be, when you can know all of another person’s most hateful thoughts, most evil actions? What hope can one have in humanity, knowing all the pain humans cause one another? Knowing the things your dearest friend truly thinks of you, knowing the resentment your parents have for you, knowing what the holy priest yearns for in his darkest fantasies? Your kindly next-door neighbor, the old woman who cooks meals for the poor and gives to charity and smiles at babies, drowned her own in the bath forty years ago. The pleasant young man in his first year of university, friendly and beloved by all, visits ladies of the night and commits unspeakable atrocities on them, knowing they will not be believed, knowing he will not be punished. Your father looks at you fondly, but behind his eyes is hatred, hatred for the youth he has lost to you, the potential you still have, and you know that he would grieve your death but rejoice in the freedom it would give him. People were not meant to truly know one another. But Jonah knew them. Jonah knew every cruelty, whether imagined or acted upon, and he knew that it outweighed the kindnesses. 

What would friendship be, to a man like that? A series of people to use and discard. What would marriage be? A wildly unequal partnership, fostering only one-sided disgust and resentment. What would parenthood be? A waste of valuable time. 

Only the gods, if they exist, should be able to See so far. Jonah made himself a god, and he never looked back.


End file.
